"Think Tank League", a new concept which encourages utilizing brilliant ideas from experts, citizens, enterprises, officials and the media to promote Wuhan's development, has come into being after a counselor selection contest in April 2012.

The contest's goals were to choose advisors from average people. The idea was well-received and stimulated citizens to create a regular forum in order to "gather wits". An official in the Wuhan counselors' office said this was the original inspiration for the "Think Tank League".

The cooperation contract has been signed by: the Wuhan counselors' office; the Center of Hubei Development Research of Wuhan University; the College of Public Administration of Huazhong University of Science and Technology; the Hubei Promotion Committee for Industry, Education and Academy; the Wuhan Entrepreneurs Association and Changjiang Net.

Li Guang, Director for the Center of Hubei Development Research of Wuhan University, said, "We will have 20 more research projects related to Hubei development every year, and we plan to use research findings in other departments to better the league".

"As a research center, we look forward to a better platform to make the transformation between research and production easier. Now we have government departments, entrepreneurs and the media who have easy access to information. This will help us accomplish our goals more conveniently."

Think tanks prevailing in western countries are mostly sponsored by the private sector. In China they mostly serve as vehicles for government research departments or academic research institutions. But Wuhan’s think tank, which possesses five different responsibilities, is different.

The first step is to find a channel to elicit civil opinions.

Wuhan's counselors' office and Changjiang Net opened a website named "Civil Think Tank" where anyone can register and make suggestions. The six citizens who participated in the final interview but failed to become counselors were invited to be the first group to give suggestions.